On Tue 25 Sep 2007 20:57:48 NZST +1200, Christopher Sawtell wrote:

> If you look in the file /etc/ca-certificates.conf you will see the
> names of all the Cert Authorities which your browser will recognise.

> cat /etc/ca-certificates.conf
cat: /etc/ca-certificates.conf: No such file or directory

> Adding a certificate yourself is not exactly mind-boggling science.

Browser: Settings->crypto config->yadda->import

There are 2 major problems with this:

1) My $RELATIVE would be able to do it with a bit of talking. They would
however not be able to assess and understand the security implications
of this.

2) Every single user of my website will have to do it. This is a k.o.
for ecommerce and many other sites.

> imho, this whole CA lark is just that. A lark to wrought money out of
> the ignorant and innocent.

Ack, the certificate mafia holding everyone at gunpoint. They do provide
a necessary service (it solves 2) above), but not at a price remotely
proportionate to the cost of providing it.

> of money!  I really do not know any of them, so why should I trust
> them for even a moment to say that some A. N. Other is trustworthy?

Their promises as to a 3rd party identity may not be worth much, but
epsilon divided by 0 is still infinitely more than 0 ... :)

There are 2 different cases we need to keep distinguishing here: I set
up a website for a limited target audience each member of which I can
personally provide with a certificate. Nothing will beat my self-made
self-signed certificate. The other is where there can not be a personal
relationship between 2 parties, hence the delegation of trust to a trust
network.

Coming back to CAcert, I'm afraid their website doesn't inspire me with
more confidence than a cert issued by Verislime&Co(TM), their idea is
good though, although the current state of affairs is not much better
with using a CAcert instead of a seld-made one, AFAICT. The previously
referenced Mozilla bug is donkeys years old and the CAcert CA still
isn't in Mozilla.

Volker

Thanks for the humour bit. ;)

-- 
Volker Kuhlmann                 is list0570 with the domain in header
http://volker.dnsalias.net/     Please do not CC list postings to me.

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